WALES are within touching distance of reaching the quarter-finals of the World Cup after their 81-7 demolition job on Namibia in New Plymouth yesterday.

That followed their victory over Samoa and a bonus point in their narrow one-point defeat against world champions South Africa in their opening game.

Fiji knocked Wales out of the last World Cup when they gained a shock victory over them in their final group game and now, four years on, the two teams meet again in their last pool match.

But the chances of a repeat are remote given the form of the two sides, Wales five points ahead of them and Fiji needing an upset of even greater proportions if they are to deny Wales a place in the last eight.

For that to happen Wales obviously have to lose to the Fijians in Hamilton on Sunday while South Africa need to beat Samoa on Friday night and deny them a losing bonus point.

If Fiji do pull off another shock victory over Wales and Samoa get no points against the Springboks the three sides would be on 10 points, but Fiji would need to beat Wales by a massive 62 points.

And Wales are looking at a likely quarter-finals place against Six Nations rivals Ireland, who they have already beaten this year, and would seek to avenge their setback in the group stages in South Africa in 1995.

But the Welsh team and management are not looking that far ahead despite being overwhelming favourites to make the quarter-finals now.

Newport Gwent Dragons No 8 Toby Faletau, who scored his second World Cup try yesterday, said: “We’ll take it one game at a time, we’ve got to play Fiji this weekend first.”

Centre Jon Davies, who enjoyed his best game for Wales, added: “Fiji will be disappointed and will want to finish on a high, but let’s get a result against them and make sure we get into the quarter-finals.”

Coach Warren Gatland has got major selection issues for the Fiji game and beyond that.

Experienced trio Stephen Jones, Ryan Jones and Gethin Jenkins all came through after making their first World Cup starts in New Zealand while injured trio James Hook, Shane Williams and Dan Lydiate could all come into the reckoning for the quarter-final, assuming Wales get there.

“We wanted selection headaches and players putting their hands up,” said Gatland after the victory over Namibia. Some players are back from injury and we will look at the tapes in the next 24 hours. Players also made an impact off the bench and Scott Williams had an outstanding game.

“Look how young a team it was. The challenge to the players was to give us a selection headache. We’ll know before we play Fiji that we could potentially be there, if South Africa beat Samoa without them getting a bonus point, and that might change our thinking.”

So if the Springboks beat Samoa comfortably and with Fiji needing to beat Wales by more than 60 points, Gatland could even rest some of his leading players for the group finale.